Does freewill exist?

[KoSmIcTRaveLer]

Can freewill exist alongside predeterminism/predestination? Like can I have freewill while being predestined to have freewill? Or like can I be predetermined to choose? Does anybody ever recall being given an infinite amount of options to choose from? And before we all were alive, did we have freewill then? If not, how could it make sense that out of nowhere we were suddenly given freewill or that we suddenly found freewill?

 

[KoSmIcTRaveLer]

I think that if we exist, we cannot choose how we exist. Or that before we were all born, we decided then every thing we would do and are now doing it. But I can see how it could be plausible that we have no more contol over what happens to us than say a plant or our sun chooses what happens to them.

 

[Rob Roy]

In order to know if a person had free will before being alive (as we know it), you would need to determine the status of people before they are alive...are they a separate entity or part of something else that is sentient ?

Part of something else that isn't sentient? Nonexistent?

 

[KoSmIcTRaveLer]

In order to know if a person had free will before being alive (as we know it), you would need to determine the status of people before they are alive...are they a separate entity or part of something else that is sentient ?

Part of something else that isn't sentient? Nonexistent?

Nonexistent, as in completely dead. I mean I personally never had a single experience prior to my 28 years on this earth. So like I had no freewill. I had nothing.

 

[Rob Roy]

Nonexistent, as in completely dead. I mean I personally never had a single experience prior to my 28 years on this earth. So like I had no freewill. I had nothing.

But how could you be certain of that ? Maybe you don't remember or can't remember ? What do you make of people who claim to remember past lives?

 

[New Age United]

No there is no such thing as freewill, the energy that makes up your body and even your mind will behave and act on the laws of physics, how could awareness possibly affect the material universe. That being said it would make sense that you were given freewill during your conception in the womb as your brain was being developed, if there actually was free will.

The idea that we created are destiny before birth is interesting and one that I've contemplated before, perhaps we are God manifesting the universe at every moment, the effortless creators of the cosmos.

 

[New Age United]

I am not a part of this world nor am I apart from this world, simply a witness

 

[Rob Roy]

If you are forced to put your hand on a hot stove, you might refrain from doing it yourself in the future. While I don't offer that as absolute proof of "free will" it certainly leads to the conclusion that conscious choices are available to people.

 

[Roger A. Shrubber]

who says predestination exists? or predetermination?
it's all theories. no one can prove a fucking bit of it...think weathermen have a cushy job? philosophers bullshit for a living...
free will does exist, we all use it every time we make a decision. we use it every time we come to a fork in the road, every time we're presented with any kind of choice, at all...when i open my door to someone knocking on it, i can be nice to them, or i can tell them to fuck off...my choice...when i do business with someone, i can try to treat them right, or i can try to fuck them over, my choice...when i take a shit, i can wash my hands or not...my choice.....all of life is the practice of freewill...
any talk of predeterminism or predestination is a cowardly attempt to deny responsibility for the consequences of the choices that YOU MADE

 

[New Age United]

who says predestination exists? or predetermination?
it's all theories. no one can prove a fucking bit of it...think weathermen have a cushy job? philosophers bullshit for a living...
free will does exist, we all use it every time we make a decision. we use it every time we come to a fork in the road, every time we're presented with any kind of choice, at all...when i open my door to someone knocking on it, i can be nice to them, or i can tell them to fuck off...my choice...when i do business with someone, i can try to treat them right, or i can try to fuck them over, my choice...when i take a shit, i can wash my hands or not...my choice.....all of life is the practice of freewill...
any talk of predeterminism or predestination is a cowardly attempt to deny responsibility for the consequences of the choices that YOU MADE

How do you get so serious about something so trivial Roger. Perhaps the truth is that there is no free will and that is the truth no matter what you want to believe, either way the truth needs no defense, only our egos need defense, if predestination is true then it is simply true and saying so doesn't have anything to do with cowardice.

 

[Roger A. Shrubber]

How do you get so serious about something so trivial Roger. Perhaps the truth is that there is no free will and that is the truth no matter what you want to believe, either way the truth needs no defense, only our egos need defense, if predestination is true then it is simply true and saying so doesn't have anything to do with cowardice.

this is a serious question to me...one that's been on my mind a long time.
if there is not a "GOD"...then predestination cannot exist...predestination requires a guiding intelligence.
if there is a guiding intelligence, i still don't believe it would map out our entire existence for us...what would be the point?
perhaps "god" built the entire universe to achieve a particular result....which seems unlikely. "god" can create the universe, why can't "god" just create the situation they desire?
i'd like to think we were created (if we were "created") out of the joy of creation...and that we're a more or less unsupervised experiment...
outside intervention in an experiment usually ruins that experiment. i'm hoping "god" has the same opinion.
the cowardice part comes in using "predestination" as an excuse to avoid responsibility for your choice..."GOD made me the way i am"....no..."god" made you the same as everyone else, your choices turned you into what you are now...

 

[New Age United]

this is a serious question to me...one that's been on my mind a long time.
if there is not a "GOD"...then predestination cannot exist...predestination requires a guiding intelligence.
if there is a guiding intelligence, i still don't believe it would map out our entire existence for us...what would be the point?
perhaps "god" built the entire universe to achieve a particular result....which seems unlikely. "god" can create the universe, why can't "god" just create the situation they desire?
i'd like to think we were created (if we were "created") out of the joy of creation...and that we're a more or less unsupervised experiment...
outside intervention in an experiment usually ruins that experiment. i'm hoping "god" has the same opinion.
the cowardice part comes in using "predestination" as an excuse to avoid responsibility for your choice..."GOD made me the way i am"....no..."god" made you the same as everyone else, your choices turned you into what you are now...

Yes I do understand what you mean about it being a copout but to speak about the subject from a philosophical stance is not cowardice. And philosophers are not just full of shit they are searching for truth and reason, everything we owe to science we owe to philosophy aswell. Imo predestination does not require intelligent design it just means that every particle of the universe is on a course that cannot possibly be changed, the laws of physics cannot be broken, try not to think of it as a story written out in time but more like a chemical reaction taking place right now, the molecules will behave a certain way once the reaction has begun there is nothing stopping it.

 

[Roger A. Shrubber]

the planet is doomed to whatever fate eventually befalls it...but individual lives are nothing but a series of choices...some choices are gates that lead to other choices, but cut off yet others...how can that be predestined? i don't know myself what i'm going to do yet...because i don't know what going to happen just a few seconds into the future...
and i don't feel much of a debt to philosophers...as far as i'm concerned, they're professional slackers. pay a room full of semi educated pothead college students to do nothing but smoke weed and try to figure out how everything works together...you'll get the complete works of heidegger, kant, bacon, camus, and decarte...if you can read it through the cheeto dust smudges...

 

[New Age United]

the planet is doomed to whatever fate eventually befalls it...but individual lives are nothing but a series of choices...some choices are gates that lead to other choices, but cut off yet others...how can that be predestined? i don't know myself what i'm going to do yet...because i don't know what going to happen just a few seconds into the future...
and i don't feel much of a debt to philosophers...as far as i'm concerned, they're professional slackers. pay a room full of semi educated pothead college students to do nothing but smoke weed and try to figure out how everything works together...you'll get the complete works of heidegger, kant, bacon, camus, and decarte...if you can read it through the cheeto dust smudges...

I guess we will have to agree to disagree Roger, I just can not believe that our minds are anything but the product of our environment, we will behave the way we are conditioned to behave and I honestly don't believe we have a choice, there is the illusion of free will but every action is the effect of a previous cause.

 

[KoSmIcTRaveLer]

But how could you be certain of that ? Maybe you don't remember or can't remember ? What do you make of people who claim to remember past lives?

I guess I can't be certain of anything in fact. It could all be an illusion.

 

[KoSmIcTRaveLer]

If you are forced to put your hand on a hot stove, you might refrain from doing it yourself in the future. While I don't offer that as absolute proof of "free will" it certainly leads to the conclusion that conscious choices are available to people.

Or I might not. If for instance I am masochistic and/or suicidal. But whatever I do, I do not do freely. I do out of instinct or impulse.

 

[KoSmIcTRaveLer]

who says predestination exists? or predetermination?
it's all theories. no one can prove a fucking bit of it...think weathermen have a cushy job? philosophers bullshit for a living...
free will does exist, we all use it every time we make a decision. we use it every time we come to a fork in the road, every time we're presented with any kind of choice, at all...when i open my door to someone knocking on it, i can be nice to them, or i can tell them to fuck off...my choice...when i do business with someone, i can try to treat them right, or i can try to fuck them over, my choice...when i take a shit, i can wash my hands or not...my choice.....all of life is the practice of freewill...
any talk of predeterminism or predestination is a cowardly attempt to deny responsibility for the consequences of the choices that YOU MADE

How can you prove that "nobody can prove a bit of it"? You said we use freewill everytime we make a decision. How can you prove anybody has ever made a decision? Can you prove that? Can you prove that after opening your door to someone choosing to knock on it, that you can be nice to them or tell them to fuck off? How can you prove that, if you can, and then how you can prove that you can prove that? So you also say that when you "take a shit" that you can either wash your hands or not. Can you prove that? If so, how? In which way can you prove that you can take a shit, and to whom? Yourself? How can you prove that I have ever made a choice, ever? Are you implying that I can do whatever I want because of my "freewill" and have no consquences? If you are not implying that, can you prove that you are not implying that? And if you can prove that, then how can you prove that? Can you prove that I have ever made a choice? If so, how?

 

[KoSmIcTRaveLer]

If you are forced to put your hand on a hot stove, you might refrain from doing it yourself in the future. While I don't offer that as absolute proof of "free will" it certainly leads to the conclusion that conscious choices are available to people.

How do you know what I might refrain from doing and what I might not refrain from doing?

 

[Rob Roy]

How do you know what I might refrain from doing and what I might not refrain from doing?

I don't know in totality.

In the instance of a hand on a hot stove, I think it's likely my example works for most people. You could be an exception I suppose. Are you?

Anyhow people would be exercising free will by refraining from putting their own hand on a hot stove. So, I'm going with the idea free will exists, but I'm open to hearing others ideas of why it doesn't.

 

[Rob Roy]

Or I might not. If for instance I am masochistic and/or suicidal. But whatever I do, I do not do freely. I do out of instinct or impulse.

So because you don't exercise free will, does that mean other people can't or haven't?